This week’s setter of The Spectator crossword is Madrigal, who gives us a puzzle entitled Order
There was a short preamble that told us “Two unclued lights provide a position and a location (three words). Another entry indicates what happened to the seven unclued holders of the position, to be entered thematically”
After building up the grid, it became clear that the unclued lights revealed the position of SPEAKER at 6a; the location being the HOUSE OF COMMONS at 1d; and the fate, BEHEADED at 23d.
Seeing the word BEHEADED, it seemed reasonable to assume the crossword focused on SPEAKERS from the past, rather than the more recent incumbents.
Records for the SPEAKER of the HOUSE OF COMMONS date back to 1377, although there is reference to a Presiding Officer in 1258. A bit more research showed that seven executions of people who had held the office occurred during the period 1399 to 1535. None of the seven was BEHEADED while serving as SPEAKER. They all later fell victim to the shifting political and religious tides of medieval and Tudor England.
The fear of executions associated with the role of SPEAKER during this time is the basis for SPEAKERS today feigning reluctance to take up the post and consequently being dragged to the chair.
The seven SPEAKERS who feature in the remaining unclued lights, without their first letter [BEHEADED] are detailed in the table below.
| Name | Speaker | Executed | Reason | Entered as, at |
| Sir John BUSSY [~1350-1399] | 1394-1398 | 1399 | supported Richard II against Henry Bolingbroke | USSY, 16a |
| Thomas THORPE [?-1461] | 1453-1454 | 1461 | supported the losing side in the Wars of the Roses | HORPE, 1a |
| Sir Thomas TRESHAM [?-1471] | 1459 | 1471 | supported losing side at the Battle of Tewkesbury | RESHAM, 12d |
| William CATESBY [1450-1485] | 1484 | 1485 | supported the wrong side at the Battle of Bosworth Field | ATESBY, 22d |
| Sir Richard EMPSON[~1450-1510] | 1491-1492 | 1510 | upset Henry VIII | MPSON, 5d |
| Edmond DUDLEY [?-1510] | 1504 | 1510 | upset Henry VIII, executed alongside Empson | UDLEY, 41a |
| Sir Thomas MORE [1478-1535] | 1523 | 1535 | refused to acknowledge Henry VIII as head of the Church of England | ORE, 18a |
Turning to the clues, they were very fair, although I’m not convinced that NEAREST at 16 down can be defined as extremely close. For instance, from a choice of Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Inverness, Edinburgh is NEAREST to London, but it’s not extremely close to London.
I have failed to parse MOMBASA. I can’t see beyond the Business Qualifications(MBAs). In the detailed table below, I suggest where the remaining letters, M, O, and A might come from, but that’s as far as I can get with the parsing. I will be interested to learn how other solvers parsed it.
The completed grid looked like this
The title, Order, relates to the word used by the SPEAKER when he/she tries to control unruly Members of Parliament. I say he/she, but there has only been one female SPEAKER, Betty Boothroyd from 1992 -2000. She became Baroness Boothroyd in 2001.
| No | Detail |
| Across | |
| 1 | tHORPE |
| 6 | SPEAKER |
| 11 |
Syrup medicine adult ingests initially, overcome by affliction (10) CAPILLAIRE (a syrup, an infusion of maidenhair fern flavoured with orange-flower water) (PILL [medicine] + AI (first letters {initially} of each of Adult and Ingests]) contained in (overcome by) CARE (affliction) CA (PILL A I) RE |
| 13 |
Insure bad developing made town-like (9) URBANISED (make town-like) Anagram of (developing) INSURE BAD URBANISED* |
| 15 | bUSSY |
| 16 |
Measure between sets of factories – it’s extremely close (7) NEAREST (at the least distance away; it’s extremely close) ARE (unit of land measurement; measure) contained in (between) NEST (a set of buildings, e.g. factories) NE (ARE) ST |
| 17 |
Guts required to initiate in advance (7) ENTERON (in higher animals, the gut or alimentary canal; guts) The two-word phrase ENTER ON is defined as begin or initiate in Chambers, but I think the wordplay has to involve ‘required to’ and ‘in advance ‘, so I can only suggest the expected wordplay is ENTER (an entry is often required to initiate a process) + ON (advance). ENTER ON |
| 18 | mORE |
| 19 |
Ordering a police car is premature (10) PRAECOCIAL (premature) Anagram of (ordering) A POLICE CAR PRAECOCIAL* |
| 21 |
Body of swimmers left last (5) FINAL (last) FINA (Fédération Internationale de Natation, International Swimming Association; body of swimmers) + L (left) FINA L |
| 24 |
Suppressed number of French reportedly (4) SANK (suppressed) SANK (sounds like [reportedly] CINQ [French for five [a number]) SANK |
| 27 |
Tease out extremities curled up at the end (4) TOSE (tease out) TOES (extremities) with the last two letters ES, forming the end of the word being reversed [curled up] to form TOSE TOSE |
| 28 |
Woody’s very pale (5) ASHEN (like ASH [a type of wood; woody]) ASHEN (very pale) double definition ASHEN |
| 30 |
One in fur coat might suggest East End’s warmer to Kate? (5,5) OTTER SHREW (a large otter-like aquatic West African insectivore; an animal that has a coat of fur) ‘OTTER (pronunciation of HOTTER by a Cockney [East Ender]) + SHREW (reference Katherina [Kate] Minola, known as the shrew in Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew) OTTER SHREW |
| 33 |
Soliloquy with hidden meaning is occasionally found (3) SLY (with hidden meaning) SLY (letters 1, 5 and 9 [occasionally] of SoliLoquY) S L Y |
| 35 |
Two women heard somewhere in Iberia (7) ANDORRA (located in the Iberian Peninsula, ANDORRA is a small European country) ANDORRA (sounds like (heard) ANN [a woman] DORA [another woman, giving two women]) ANDORRA |
| 36 |
Kenyan city’s business qualifications are once more to the fore (7) MOMBASA (second largest city in Kenya) MBAS (Masters of Business Administration) are business qualifications. This leaves letters MOA, which I can see are the first letters [to the fore] of each of More, Once and Are, but I don’t see an anagram indicator that generates the order of the letters in MOMBASA MOMBASA |
| 37 |
Horatio Walpole’s state (4) IOWA (One of the 50 States of the United States of America) IOWA (hidden word in [‘s, indicating possession] horatIO WAlpole) IOWA |
| 38 |
Asian herd wandering for a month (4,5) ADAR SHENI (Adar Sheni is defined in Chambers as Veadar, an intercalary month in the Jewish calendar, following Adar in embolismic years when days are inserted into the calendar to correct errors) Anagram of (wandering) ASIAN HERD ADAR SHENI* |
| 39 |
Fantastic author copied revolving desolate land (5-5) NEVER-NEVER (idyllic; fantastic) (VERNE [reference the French author Jules VERNE [1828 – 1905] + VERNE again [copied]) and cycling two characters to the right to form NEVER-NEVER NEVER-NEVER |
| 40 |
College caterer provides dish that’s ’eavy (7) STEWARD (college caterer) STEW (dish of cooked meat) + ‘ARD (‘eavy – hard/heavy) STEW ARD |
| 41 | aUDLEY |
| Down | |
| 1 | HOUSE OF COMMONS |
| 2 |
This sharpens sound under frets (8) RUBSTONE (a whetstone; a stone for sharpening edged instruments; this sharpens) RUBS (frets) + TONE (a sound) RUBS TONE |
| 3 |
Short walker about to mince briefly in stages (6) PHASED (in stages) PED (abbreviation for PEDestrian [walker]) containing (about) HASh (to mince) excluding the final letter (briefly) H P (HAS) ED |
| 4 |
Hardy heroine, sick or inside is one with needle? (9) TAILORESS (someone who works with a needle) (AIL [sick] + OR) contained in (inside) TESS (reference TESS of the d’Urbervilles, heroine of a novel by Thomas Hardy [1840 – 1928]) T (AIL OR) ESS |
| 5 | eMPSON |
| 6 |
Will’s descendent seen around school of painting (8) SIENNESE (a school of painting that flourished in Italy from the 13th to 15th centuries) SIEN (Shakespearean [Will’s] word for scion [descendant]) + an anagram of (around) SEEN SIEN NESE* |
| 7 |
The Spanish elevate jazz composer (5) ELGAR (reference Edward ELGAR [1857 – 1934], English composer) EL (Spanish word for ‘the’) + RAG (ragtime, a form of jazz music) reversed (elevated; down entry) EL GAR< |
| 8 |
Scottish corporations’ rumours to test public opinion (5) KITES (Scottish word for paunches, bellies or corporations) KITES (rumours or suggestions given out to see how the wind blows and test public opinion) double definition KITES |
| 9 |
Incite literary reformation – a trait of the Spectator crossword? (14) RECTILINEARITY (something straight, bounded by straight lines. The Spectator crossword grid displays such a property) Anagram of (reformation) INCITE LITERARY RECTILINEARITY* |
| 10 |
Sultanate reported tea nearby (6) BRUNEI (BRUNEI Darussalam is an independent country , headed by a Sultan, on the island of Borneo.) BRU NEI (sounds like [reported] BREW [tea] NIGH [nearby]) BRU NEI |
| 12 | tRESHAM |
| 14 |
Ruins speech of King (6) WRECKS (ruins) WRECKS (sounds like [speech of] REX [King]) double definition WRECKS |
| 20 |
Tender includes loan machine to finish cloth here? (9) CALENDRER (a machine with rollers for finishing or glazing the surface of cloth) CARER (tender) containing (includes) LEND (loan) CA (LEND) RER |
| 22 | cATESBY |
| 23 | BEHEADED |
| 25 |
Flower is dear, clearly (8) CHERWELL (river [flower] that is a tributary of the River Thames) CHER (dear) + WELL (clearly, as I can see WELL/clearly) CHER WELL |
| 26 |
Flasher apparent in finest robes (6) STROBE (an instrument for studying rotating machinery or other periodic phenomena by means of a flashing lamp; flasher) STROBE (hidden word in [in] fineST ROBEs) STROBE |
| 29 |
Former mission operated in outskirts of Ecuador, deserted (6) ERRAND (archaic [former] word for ‘mission’) (RAN [managed; operated] contained in [in] (ER [outer letters of {outskirts of} EcuadoR] + D [deserted]) ER (RAN) D |
| 31 |
Showed disapproval, cried eyes out! (6) BOOHED (showed disapproval) BOO–HooED (cried) excluding (out) the second OO (symbol depicting eyes) BOOHED |
| 32 |
To affect old Latin, I love Virgil’s Eclogues principally (5) AMOVE (obsolete word [old] ‘affect’) AMO (Latin for ‘I love’) + VE (initial letters of [principally] each of Virgil and Epilogue) AMO V E |
| 34 |
Kuenssberg say, left with distinctive character (5) LAURA (reference LAURA Kuenssberg [born 1976]], BBC political journalist) L (left) + AURA (distinctive character) L AURA |
| 35 |
For a century plant area grew soft (5) AGAVE (a plant of the aloe-like American genus Agave of amaryllids, in Mexico usually flowering about the seventh year, in hothouse conditions requiring 40-60 [popularly]100 years; century plant) A (area) + GAVE (grew soft) A GAVE |
Good fun I thought, clever idea for a theme and well executed!
MOMBASA
MBAS (Business qualifications) + A (Are, the unit of measurement for an area of land), then MO to the fore (Mo, an old word for ‘more’ which Chambers indicates as archaic, hence ‘once’).
Thanks for the blog, especially the historical detail, and thanks to Madrigal.